I have 1 class of java under my belt at my university and will be going for another this Fall but want to know what would be the best language to develop software. I'm looking to make something that a retail store would use for inventory, ringing up items, and so forth if your familiar with the IRis software something similiar to that what should I begin to learn

That really depends... alot of languages could get the job done. What platform are you running on? Will it need to run on multiple platforms? Gui/ command line? Does it need to have any AI in it? These are the types of questions you should be asking yourself when you pick a language.

Cheers

I've never made any software before so I dont know what what a GUI is it doesn't need command prompts though other then a login screen maybe

GUI = graphical user interface, which is what you're using right now if you're reading this message! Even a login screen is a GUI.

One of the key differences in languages that I've run into in the industry is the tech support. I'm working for a big corporation who's head over heels in love with Microsoft and refuses to go open source due to the tech support benefits they get from being a Microsoft Partner. My client refuses to switch over to something open source like Java because there is no retail support for it. Heck, we finally have to convert our Delphi applications to C# because of management changes, and Delphi just isn't cool in their eyes.

so if I was trying to sell software to a corporation I'd prolly want to use C# because of the tech support? or couldnt I just offer them my own tech support or would C# eliminate that?

You can always offer your own tech support. when he says tech support he means developer tech support. So while you're developing it then you can call up some microsoft techs and ask for help. Not customer tech support. If you've never programmed anything before what you're looking at will take you a very long time. You are first going to have to learn the language of choice and then actually code it. BOth of which are very time intensive. So I would suggest starting out with some easier command line apps until you get familiar with programming and then once you have that down then you can start GUI apps. THEN when you get comfortable with GUI apps then you can try out your idea.

Hope this helps

Cheers

Yeah, I meant developer tech support. I'm not saying you absolutely must use C#, but I'm just explaining my situation. My client's CIO explained that if they were experiencing a problem with Microsoft code, and the Microsoft developer tech support couldn't help them via phone or email, then my client supposedly has the power to actually request the Microsoft employees get on a plane and bring the native code with them so that my client can debug it themselves. It's all heresay though.

I've never made an application ready to sell, but I imagine you would just need to offer your own support. In this case, you're self-employed, so you would be responsible for offering your own support when the customer submits a "bug" report, which may either be a user error, or it's something that you would need to fix with your code and upload a patch for your customer to download (i.e. if your program ends up using 100% CPU, there's a good chance you accidentally put in an infinite while/for loop that needs to be fixed).